Reuters reports -- Aung San Suu Kyi, the long-time standard-bearer for democracy in Myanmar, is taking a leap of faith in running for parliament on Sunday, opting to enter a political system crafted and run by the soldiers who kept her locked up for a total of 15 years.
Her party's participation in this weekend's by-elections marks a change of heart for the Nobel Peace Prize winner who repeatedly rebuffed the military's attempts to bring her into a political apparatus in which it dictated the terms.
But since a general election in November 2010, followed by Suu Kyi's release from house arrest the same month, the pace of change in the former Burma under a nominally civilian government has been staggering, enough to convince her to compromise with the apparently reform-minded ex-generals now in charge.
Some Burmese fear it is a deal with the devil that will serve mainly to endorse a military-dominated legislature.
Suu Kyi is keeping an open mind.
"Some are a little bit too optimistic about the situation. We are cautiously optimistic. We are at the beginning of a road," the 66-year-old Suu Kyi said last month.
"Many people are beginning to say that the democratization process here is irreversible. It's not so."
